Skip to main content
Margin is the money you put down as collateral to open and hold a leveraged position. Think of it as the capital that supports your trade. In Entry Finance, you can see and adjust margin usage directly from the trading panel in Open positions and orders. In spot trading, you usually pay the full value of the asset. In leveraged trading, you only provide part of the position value as margin, and the position itself can be much larger.

​
Why it matters

Margin is important because it determines:
  • whether you can open a position
  • how much market movement your trade can handle
  • how close you are to liquidation
The less margin your position has, the less room it has to survive a move against you.

​
Simple example

Imagine you want to open a 500 USDC position. If you use 100 USDC as margin, that 100 USDC is the collateral behind the trade.
  • If the trade goes in your favor, profit is earned on the full 500 USDC position
  • If the trade goes against you, losses also come from that full position
If losses become too large, the platform may close the trade automatically. That is liquidation.

​
Initial margin and maintenance margin

You may see two related ideas:
  • Initial margin: the amount needed to open the trade
  • Maintenance margin: the minimum amount needed to keep it open
You do not need to memorize the formulas right away. The simple idea is: not enough remaining margin = position is at risk

​
Why beginners should care

Many beginners think margin is just a technical setting. It is not. Margin is directly connected to risk. If you use too little margin, even a normal market move can put your trade in danger. If you use enough margin, the same trade has more room to breathe.

​
Practical example

You open a BTC perpetual position with:
  • position size: 1,000 USDC
  • margin: 200 USDC
If the trade starts losing money, those losses reduce the 200 USDC margin. The smaller that cushion becomes, the closer the position gets to liquidation. If you want to understand how the terminal arrives at the liquidation boundary and why that number can move while the trade is open, continue to Liquidation price and risk engine.

​
Why margin can appear again after you used your full balance

Sometimes you open a trade, use all available margin, and later notice that part of the balance becomes available again. This usually happens for one of these reasons:
  • the position moved into profit, so unrealized PnL increased your available collateral
  • one or more open orders were filled, reduced, or canceled, which released reserved funds
  • the position size became smaller after a partial close, so less margin was needed to support it
  • under cross margin, your account balance is shared across positions, so changes in PnL and open exposure can change what is available
In simple terms, the platform is recalculating how much of your balance is still needed to support open risk right now. That means the newly available amount is not “extra money from nowhere”. It is capital that is no longer locked as tightly as before.

​
What you can do with newly available margin

If margin becomes available again, you can usually use it in the same ways as any other free collateral in the account:
  • open another position
  • add size to an existing trade
  • place new orders
  • transfer or withdraw it, if it is not needed for open positions and active orders
But this should be done carefully. If the available amount came from unrealized profit, that number can shrink again if the market reverses. In other words, available margin can increase while the trade is going well and then fall again if price moves back against you. The safest way to think about it is:
  • realized balance is stable
  • unrealized PnL can temporarily increase available margin
  • funds locked in positions or active orders are not fully free to use elsewhere
So if you suddenly see margin available after using your full balance, first check whether it comes from profit, canceled orders, or a change in position size before using it for a new trade. This is also why the balance shown in the terminal can differ from what is immediately transferable or withdrawable in Spot and perpetuals balances.